IKEA’s Furniture Makes Wireless Charging a Reality

IKEA’s Furniture Makes Wireless Charging a Reality

When the world’s biggest furniture maker says that it wants to make a big announcement, you know that you need to listen to it. IKEA, the Sweden based furniture maker, recently announced that its latest collection of home furnishings like bedside lamps, tables, desks and other furniture incorporates technology that will help the user to wirelessly charge their Smart phones. This union of home equipment with technology is sure to provide an incentive that IKEA needs to continue to surpass its competitors. The products will be made available in North America and Europe from mid- April with intentions to expand into other regions soon.

The furniture incorporates a station identified by a small cross symbol, which will wirelessly charge the phone when placed on top of the slot. Also known as induction- charging, this method uses an electromagnetic field to transfer energy and thus recharge the phone’s battery. The bases of lamps and the surface of tables are some of the places where the charging station is placed.

IKEA has teamed up with Wireless Power Consortium (WPC), to use the Qi technology to come up with such products. Certain mobile phones by Samsung, HTC, and Nokia which are already implanted with Qi technology will be compatible with this new line of furniture. However, those with iPhones and Samsung’s Galaxy range of phones need not despair for IKEA plans to launch a series of pads that can be simply added to any of its furniture surface to produce the same charging ability. Along with this, the company will also be launching a separate charging pad that will have 3 charging ports which can be used in offices and homes for multiple users.

According to IKEA, the idea is not to foray into electronics but to make homes smarter. The fact that wires and cables are considered a mess was understood well by the IKEA designers and hence they came up with this solution. Now, people don’t need to worry about losing the charger or not finding one with the right pin. Any product that incorporates this feature will be sold for an additional $25. IKEA proposes to sell one to two collections incorporating this technology every year, with the first collection having about fifteen items. The company has plans to go further and release about ten collections per year in the future.

With competition growing fierce everywhere, this novel idea by IKEA promises to become popular with over seven hundred devices already being compatible with its furniture. In the days to come, wireless charging will be the norm with IKEA being a leader and visionary in the field.

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